42 (TV story)
42 'is the seventh episode of the third series of [[Doctor Who|''Doctor Who]]. It was written by Chris Chibnall, directed by Graeme Harper and featured David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor and Freema Agyeman as Martha Jones. Overview To be added Synopsis Summoned by a distress call, the Doctor and Martha are stranded and forced into action on board a derelict spacecraft with no power that's only 42 minutes away from colliding with the sun. As they struggle desperately to alter course or re-engage power, a creature stalks the ship's hallways wearing the skin of a crew member, a creature that can reduce everybody to smouldering silhouettes of cinder and ash. With not a second to spare, the Doctor is forced to take unprecedented action and drastic risk to preserve his friend's life and the lives of everybody aboard, even at severe threat to himself. Plot In the TARDIS, the Doctor upgrades Martha's phone with his sonic screwdriver into a superphone as a 'frequent flier's privilege'. Before she can try it out, however, the TARDIS receives a distress call and the Doctor rears the ship towards it's source. They land aboard a ship inside a heat chamber increasing in intensity; as they step out into the corridor, the crew of the ship, lead by Captain Kath McDonnell charge up the corridor and pull them out before sealing the chamber behind them. While introducing themselves, Martha moves over to a viewing port as the computer gives a 42-minute marker. The Doctor joins Martha at the window and discovers that the entire ship is on a collision course with a sun. The Doctor tries to get back into the vent chamber for the TARDIS but it is too hot to regain entry, so the Doctor suggests repairing the engines to change course and follows them to engineering where the engines have been further sabotaged, almost beyond repair and no sign of fellow crew members Ashton and Korwin. McDonnell says the auxiliary engines are at the front of the ship, sealed off behind dead-locked, password-sealed bulkheads. She sends crewman Riley off to unseal the doors and Martha goes with him to help. Ashton calls McDonnell to the MedCentre; the Doctor and Scannell go with him. When they arrive, McDonnell's husband Korwin is being restrained in a stasis chamber by Ashton and Medical Offical Abi Lerner. Ashton says that he suddenly went berserk and destroyed the engine before sealing the ship. Korwin refuses to open his eyes for some reason so the Doctor sedates him to calm him down. He sends McDonnell and Ashton back to the engines to try and repair them before following them. After they leave, Korwin's hand clenches. Martha and Riley get to the first door to the front of the ship and start working their way through them; when the Doctor can't help them answer some of the questions, she calls her mother Francine with her superphone to get the answers. In the MedCentre, Abi looks over Korwin's medical results when Korwin suddenly wakes up behind her and advances on her, consuming her in a great intensity of heat and light. The rest of the crew hear her screams over the comms system and the Doctor, McDonnell and Scannell return to the MedCentre to find a burnt indent in the wall in her shape, having been killed by vaporisation and Korwin gone. McDonnell refuses to believe Korwin is capable of this but the Doctor looks at his bio-scan results which seem to indicate he's been overwhelmed by an external force. McDonnell contacts the rest of the crew and warns them of the threat he poses. Meanwhile, Erina collects some equipment for Ashton where she is confronted by Korwin and killed as well. The Doctor confesses to McDonnell that there is nothing that can be done for Korwin but she insists that there is nothing that anyone on the ship did to cause this. Martha and Riley make it to Area 17 of the ship while Korwin confronts Ashton in the engine room; instead of killing him, however, Korwin transfers his condition over the Ashton instead. The newly-affected Ashton finds Riley and Martha in Area 17 and they run into an escape pod to hide. However, Ashton then starts to eject them towards the sun and Martha contacts the Doctor for help. While he runs to their aid, Riley attempts to stop the jettison from inside the pod and is successful when Ashton reengages it from outside and crushes the circuit by punching the terminal, meaning the launch can't be stopped. McDonnell and Scannell return to the engine room where they are intercepted by Korwin; he nearly attacks McDonnell but he falters when he recognises her and accuses her of it being 'her fault'. Before he can kill her, Scannell subjects him to freezing and takes him down. The Doctor confronts Ashton in Area 17 when he feels the effect of Korwin and heads towards the engine room. The airlock suddenly ejects the pod as the Doctor watches it drift away towards the sun from inside the ship. While McDonnell mourns Korwin, the Doctor calls Scannell to Area 17 with a spacesuit, with McDonnell promising to deal with Ashton if she finds him. Inside the pod, Riley comforts Martha as they drift away from the ship; she calls her mum and apologises for her earlier attitude before hanging up. On the ship, the Doctor, against Scannell's advisement, suits up and prepares to remagnetise the pod from the hull. Ashton follows McDonnell into the MedCentre where she throws him into the stasis chamber and freezes him to death. Scannell opens the airlock, despite his reservations and the Doctor, painfully, tries to enact the remagnetisation, barely managing to reach the controls with the pressures of the sun and vacuum of space to contend with. Regardless, he succeeds and the pod starts being pulled back to the ship to Riley and Martha's joy. Before going back inside, the Doctor stares at the surface of the sun and realises the truth about it: it's a living creature. He pulls himself through the airlock as the pod re-docks and Martha finds him dragging himself across the floor, now a victim of the same affliction as Ashton and Korwin. McDonnell arrives and he blames her for all that's happened; he scooped the sun's heart for fuel and caused it pain great enough to reach out and infect the crew out of agony. The Doctor tells Martha to freeze him in the stasis chamber at -200 degrees to freeze the condition out of him. Meanwhile, Korwin awakens below and goes looking for McDonnell while Riley goes to help Scannell with the doors. Martha and McDonnell get the Doctor to the MedCentre and place him in the stasis chamber, setting it for -200, promising to keep him in there for only 10 seconds. In engineering, Korwin shuts off the power to the stasis chamber too soon and McDonnell goes to intercept him and while the Doctor tells Martha to get to the auxiliary engines to dump the fuel and eject the sun's particles. McDonnell is confronted by Korwin in engineering and she leads him towards an airlock while Martha runs to the front of the ship to meet Riley and Scannell. Sealing the airlock while they're both inside it, McDonnell decompresses and unseals it, sending them both plummeting into the vacuum, apologising to her friends as she does so. Riley and Scannell finally make it to the auxillaries and Martha joins them while the Doctor, failing to keep the condition back, gives into to it and starts slowly following. Martha joins Riley and Scannell and tells them to dump the fuel and the auxilliaries ignite as they do so. As the move away from the sun with the ejection of the sun particles, the Doctor returns to normal and Martha reunites with him. Later, before they leave, Riley and Scannell launch a distress call and receive word of a ship coming to collect them. The Doctor goes inside the TARDIS and Martha shares a goodbye kiss with Riley before she follows him inside; as thanks for saving his life, yet again, the Doctor gives her a TARDIS key; another 'frequent flier's privilege'. Martha gives her mum one last call; upon hanging up though, it's revealed that Francine has had her calls monitored by people working for 'Mr. Saxon', as she is helping them in the hopes that they'll get Martha away from the Doctor. Cast * The Doctor - David Tennant * Martha Jones - Freema Agyeman * Kath McDonnell - Michelle Collins * Francine Jones - Adjoa Andoh * Riley Vashtee - William Ash * Orin Scannell - Anthony Flanagan * Hal Korwin - Matthew Chambers * Dev Ashton - Gary Powell * Abi Lerner - Vinette Robinson * Erina Lessak - Rebecca Oldfield * Sinister Woman - Elize du Toit Crew To be added References To be added Story Notes To be added Continuity To be added Home video and audio releases To be added External Links * Official ''42'' page on '''Doctor Who Website